The Playground (The Flight of Icarus)
by RZZMG
Summary: Lily Luna Potter was seven years old the first time she noticed the rusted metal columns of the playground stretched against the stark, grey London skyline... the first time she noticed Tom. Lily Luna Potter & Tom Riddle. 2015 HP-Darkarts Horror Fest entry. Creepy Horror/Drama/Children meeting in a phantom playground, horcruxes, spells, murder. COMPLETE!
1. Chapter 1

**AUTHOR'S NOTES:**

 **This was my entry for the 2015 HP DarkArts Horror Fest (hp-darkarts . livejournal . com). This is a multi-chaptered story. I'll post up a chapter for you every few days until it's done.**

 _PROMPT:_ #65 – _An abandoned playground. Squeaky swinging swings when there isn't a breeze for miles. Any of the next gen children._

 **Thanks to lj user "amorette" who came up with this fantastic prompt that tickled my muse! Hope you like it!**

 **Thank you to my beta, YW. I appreciate how painstakingly precise you were in your revisions, and the suggestions made were fabulous! Three revisions & we finally finished it!**

 **Thank you to the awesome Mab for hosting this fun fest, and for your immense support & understanding.**

 **Please review, if you would!**

 **P.S. There were some changes to this piece since the fest version. Please check them out, starting here in Chapter 1!**

* * *

 **Revision 1.0: April-May, 2015**

 **Revision 2.0: August-September, 2015**

 **Disclaimer:** "Harry Potter" is the property of J.K. Rowling, Scholastic Books, and Warner Brothers. This fanfiction was written entirely for fun, not for profit, and no copyright infringement is intended.

 **Timeline:** Post-Hogwarts, Epilogue compliant

 **Main Characters:** Lily Luna Potter & Tom Riddle; Ginny Weasley, Harry Potter

 **Summary:** Lily Luna Potter was seven years old the first time she noticed the rusted metal columns of the playground stretched against the stark, grey London skyline.

 **Warnings:** Drama-Angst, Drug addiction, Innocence corrupted, Implied Secondary Character death (off-screen), Reincarnation of a horcrux

* * *

 _ **THE PLAYGROUND (alternatively, "The Flight of Icarus")**_

 _ **By: RZZMG**_

* * *

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Come play with me…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Lily Luna Potter was seven years old the first time she noticed the rusted metal columns of the playground stretched against the stark, grey London skyline.

It was mid-October when the song of decaying iron carried on the autumn wind, its sharp, tangy melody turning her head in the direction of the abandoned park. The flavour of it in the air was grating, like an old coin scraped against one's front teeth, its metallic and stale tune as polluted as the industrial air of the city all around. Still, it was an enchanting hymn to a child's imagination…

 _'Blood and memory… something living, something dead… and a soul in trade.'_

The child's nursery rhyme played out in her head in a demented 'Ring a Ring o' Roses' tune.

The squeaky wooden swings tucked behind the park's rickety fence line were riddled by weather, their paint curling like mouldy orange rinds. The old roundabout groaned as the brisk fall breeze turned it on its decaying centre pin. The ancient seesaw was a wounded soldier, its seats filled with holes and its joints stained with an oily, black residue. Dirty, yellowing leaves littered the playground's greyish, limp grass.

At first, she'd thought it to be just another forgettable and forgotten Muggle place, like the empty storefronts that lined the High Streets her Great Auntie Petunia liked to visit before she'd caught the kind of lurgy that made her cough blood and gasp for her oxygen tank to be turned up, but as she tugged against her mother's hold on her wrist, Lily began to suspect the empty lot was unlike any place she'd ever seen before.

 _I'm over here,_ the forgotten equipment seemed to call out to her, and she'd asked her mother why everyone had abandoned such an interesting place.

Even at such a tender age, she'd known what such a grown-up word as 'abandoned' meant. It meant someone didn't love you anymore, that they didn't care enough about you to come around and take care of you like they should. That they'd lost interest in you, and they'd found something else to take your place.

It's what her mother had frequently said her father had done to them, abandoned them _"for that filthy Parkinson woman."_

"Come along, Lily," her mother said, her tone clipped as she tugged on Lily's wrist. She was impatient to get them out of Muggle London as soon as possible, clearly uncomfortable by the very presence of those who lacked magical talents. She seemed terrified of being robbed by the crowd, in fact, holding tightly onto the paper bag with the medicines that nice Asian shoppe owner had proscribed her. "We've got to get home quickly."

With a final look over her shoulder, Lily cast the abandoned playground one last longing glance and then allowed herself to be pulled about by her mum all the way to the closest Apparition point, several blocks away.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _See me…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

The next time they went past the playground was several weeks later, when her mother's medicines had run out, and this time, Lily saw something different through the metal links of the fence: a boy, sitting on the swings. He looked up at her as she went past.

"Mummy, who is that?" she asked, pointing at strange boy with the dark hair and the funny-looking uniform. Were those short trousers? Maybe he was in a private school.

"Where?" her mother asked, without ever looking in the direction Lily pointed. Her mother was focussed on the crosswalk light across the street from them, waiting for it to turn. Her sweaty grip on Lily's hand was almost painful, as if she feared losing her daughter while surrounded by Muggles and Muggle automobiles.

Lily peered up at her mum, noticing for the first time the line of sweat above her top lip and the glassy look in her eyes. "Mummy, are you alright?" she whispered, forgetting about the boy and the playground, huddling closer to her mother.

"I'm fine," her mother barked at her, then seemed to realise that people around them were now staring at her and amended her tone. "I'm fine, sweetheart. We're almost there."

They crossed the street, heading for the Chinese medicine shoppe her mum had visited the last time they were down here. It wasn't until Lily reached the other side that she glanced back at the playground.

The boy was gone.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Don't pass me by again…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

The next time they passed the playground, it was almost the end of spring.

Lily's mum had to stop and rest on a nearby bench before crossing the street. She'd claimed to need only a short breather, but was perspiring so heavily that her face was beet red. She took to fanning herself with a discarded newspaper to avoid using magic in front of so many Muggle witnesses.

Her delay gave Lily time to glance through the rusted grate at the playground.

The boy was there again. He was sitting on the roundabout as it slowly turned around and around. When he noticed her watching him, he stopped the carousel whirling with a single foot and tilted his head, as if he were as curious about her as she was about him.

Lily stared back, unsure if it waving would be appropriate. She'd always been taught not to be too friendly to strangers, especially non-related children, because one never knew if they were part of the magical world or not, and an accidental mention of magic around a Muggle could get her and her family in trouble with the Hit Wizards.

As her mum recovered on the shaded bench, paying her absolutely no attention, Lily and the boy gazed at each other across the distance, sizing each other up. _Who are you_ , she finally mouthed, but she wasn't sure he could see her lips from where he stood to read them.

A slow, excited smile tugged at the corner of his lips. He had understood her!

Crooking a finger at her, he attempted to entice her into crossing the fence line and joining him.

Lily's first instinct was to shake her head, which she did. Then, she again peeked over at her mum sitting on the bench, hand over her closed eyes, and knew a chance to sneak off when she saw one. Her Uncle George would be proud of her for daring her mother's wrath, she knew, as she searched for an opening in the fence. When she found a section where the wire looked as if it had been cut at the bottom and bent outward to allow a small person admittance, she pulled back on it and made enough room for her to crawl past. Being the smallest Weasley certainly had its advantages!

The sounds of the city immediately dropped away as she stood up and looked around. Everything seemed muted in the playground, much… _browner_. Like the colour had been leeched away from everything living, and a thin layer of mud painted over the top of it. She wondered if it wasn't because to either side of the small space were tall high-rise buildings filled with offices, and that they somehow blocked the sun from reaching the playground during certain times of the day.

The squeak of the roundabout turning again was a shrill whine in the dull hush. Lily put her hands over her ears, finding the sound offensive.

"I knew you'd come."

The boy startled her, his appearance at her side taking her by complete surprise. She dropped her hands and stared at him.

The first up-close glimpse of him decided it: he was odd—as muted as the playground around them, but equally as compelling to her senses. He was dressed rather funny, in clothing that no one else she knew wore. His trouser shorts looked dated and were a bit ragged at the hems. His shoes were scuffed, and the grey, woolen coat he wore over his button-down had tattered stitching that needed mending. Despite those flaws, though, Lily had to admit that he was quite cute, with piercing blue eyes and lovely dark hair.

And then that enchanting, naughty smile appeared again, and she was hopelessly lost.

"What's your name?" he asked, taking her by the arm and leading her towards the swings.

"Lily."

He paused and looked at her, rubbing two fingers against the side of his temple, as if trying to recall something important. "Lily… I'm sure I knew a Lily once. She… I think she died, though." He dropped his hand, squinched up his eyes, and thrust his face towards her, looking her over. "What's your family name?"

"Potter," she told him, seeing no reason to lie. "Lily Luna Potter."

The boy's shock was palpable as he leaned away from her. "Potter?" His eyes glazed over as he turned his thoughts inward and a dark look of concentration passed over his features. He whispered the name a few times, seeming to roll it around his tongue as if sampling it, searching for some lost connection. "That sounds familiar, too. I almost… know it."

Lily shrugged. She was used to people reacting strangely anytime she told them her name. Sometimes they looked at her with awe, other times with fear. Honestly, it made her feel rather freakish, and that was one thing she didn't want this boy to think about her. "My father's kind of famous, but you won't hold it against me, will you?"

He blinked, turned his head, and for the second time in as many minutes, Lily was captivated by the blue of the boy's eyes. They were as bright as a crystal, spring sky shedding winter's icy hold.

"No, I won't… as long as you don't hold it against me that I'm an orphan."

That she could do. No one should be teased for the loss of their parents. She held her other hand out to shake. "Okay, deal."

The boy looked down at her hand, and a flittering smile returned to his face. Tentatively, he took her fingers in his, holding them as lightly as one might a butterfly, careful not to cause harm. His hand, she noted, was rather cold. "Deal," he agreed. When he let her go, it was with reluctance.

The rusty rasping of the swing brushed by a strong breeze captured his attention as thoroughly as the calling of one's name, and he turned his head and became fixated on it.

"Are you… okay?" Lily asked after several minutes standing in awkward silence. She reached up and tugged the elbow of his coat. "Hello?"

He glanced at her sideways and that sweet, little smile returned to his face. "Come on, you sit on the swing and I'll push." Reaching for her wrist, he tugged her forwards.

They ran to the swings together, and Lily took a seat on the grimy wooden bench. It creaked under her weight, and she held on to the rusty chains with a death grip, hoping her mum wouldn't yell at her later for getting dirty. "Ready," she announced, and the boy came up behind her and put his hands over hers. A shiver went through her at the contact. He really was quite icy! He definitely needed a pair of mittens.

"Don't swing too high," he warned, leaning his mouth to her ear. "It's old and might break."

"Okay."

With that, he pulled back on the chains a bit and then let go, setting Lily off. A gentle push on her back each time the swing returned to its starting position kept her in motion, and she used her small frog-like legs to maintain her momentum.

"I feel like I'm flying," she cried out in joy and laughed.

"You are," the boy reminded her. "You're off the ground, aren't you?"

"It's almost like being on a broom, chasing the wind!" Her Uncles frequently took her up on their brooms, sometimes even going above the tops of the apple trees in the orchard at the Burrow. She couldn't wait to own her own someday!

The pushing stopped. She glanced behind her, and the boy had moved off to the side to avoid her backwards motion. He was staring at the ground, frowning. Scuffing her shoes, she slowed to a full stop. "What's wrong?"

"Flying on a broom? Is that even… possible?" He seemed greatly disturbed by the notion.

She glanced at him askance. Was he, perhaps, not a wizard, but Muggle?

"What do you think?"

He glanced into the air and a fierce excitement overtook his features. "I think it would be brilliant to own the skies like that! Maybe someday even fly so high you touch the moon!" His arm extended towards the heavens, his fingers stretched wide, a longing so poignant on his face that Lily felt her chest hitch in pity for him.

"It wouldn't work like that," she told him. Oh, yes, she'd been told stories by her father of Muggles riding spaceships to the moon, but she thought them very fanciful tales. Surely, it wasn't true. Her mother had always said not to believe everything her father said, after all. "You wouldn't be able to fly that high without passing out and falling to your death. Like Icarus."

The boy dropped his arm to his side, but continued to look up, watching the lazy, grey-brown clouds overhead drift by. "Who?" he asked, frowning again.

"Icarus. You know, the Greek fellow who built some wings out of feathers and wax, but he flew too near the sun and the wax melted. He fell to his death. My cousin, Rose, says his story is her favourite of the Greek myths. She reads a lot."

"Why on earth would Icarus fly towards the sun?" The boy seemed quite curious as to why someone would do such a thing, knowing the sun burned up anything it touched. "Why not the moon?"

She shrugged. "Because he thought the sun was the biggest power in the universe and wanted to challenge it. Rose said it was because he thought he was invincible."

As her new friend's eyes widened at her use of such a big word, Lily felt proud that she'd been able to pronounce it without stumbling over the letters once, _and_ that she also knew the word's meaning. Sometimes, it was a good thing being cousins with someone swotty, she decided.

The boy thought about what she'd said for a moment in silence.

"Sounds like he got what he deserved in the end, the arrogant git."

Lily stood up, staring towards the fence line. On the other side, she could see her mother had recovered and was now looking around for her, calling out her name around a cupped hand, although Lily could not hear her voice.

"I have to go," she told him. "My mum's calling."

The boy's shoulders slumped. "You're the only person who's ever come to play with me. Can't you stay a little longer?"

She glanced at him, and boldly reached out to take his hand in hers again, noting again how very chilly his fingers were. Her smart cousin, Rose, would say his circulation must not be very good, like Grandmum Weasley's. She made a mental note to remember to bring him a pair of her hand-knit gloves next time she came to see him. She had several pair, and could spare one for him.

"I'll be back. We can play and talk some more, then."

"Promise?"

Acting on impulse, she stretched up on tiptoe, for the boy was inches taller than she was, and she pressed a quick peck to his cheek. "Yes, kissy swear," she vowed in the same way she, Albus, and James always sealed their promises to each other. Then, feeling flushed and giddy at being so bold, she turned for the opening in the fence, running fast so she could minimize her mother's anger.

At the exit to the playground, she turned back to look, unable to leave without one final question. "Hey, um, what's your name?"

The boy shoved his hands in his shorts-trouser pockets and gave her a lopsided grin. "Just realised you hadn't asked?"

"Tell me!" she demanded, shaking her head and giggling. She had been terribly rude today, not even asking for a proper introduction before running off to play. Grandmum Weasley would smack the back of her hands with a spoon if she knew!

He waved in good-bye, and shouted back, "It's Tom."

For some strange reason, knowing his name made Lily's heart glow. "Nice to meet you, Tom!" she said with a wave. "See you again soon!"

"See you, Lily!"

Crawling through the fence line deposited her back on the Muggle street. The noise of the traffic returned, assailing her ears with its familiar heavy, confusing hum. Getting to her feet, she hurried back towards the bench and her mother's side.

One last look through the chain link showed her Tom was gone. Only an empty, dying playground remained, choked with tired grass pushed around by an eerie wind that seemed to sing.

 _'Blood and memory… something living, something dead… and a soul in trade.'_

* * *

 _ **TO BE CONTINUED...**_

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

 **What do you think so far? Sufficiently creepy? Please review and let me know!**

 **P.S. This is my first Tom Riddle as the main character story! I'm excited to try him out. :)**


	2. Chapter 2

**~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Let's find mischief together…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Several times over that summer Lily visited the playground, while her mother became increasingly preoccupied by the store that sold the Chinese medicines on the corner.

Honestly, Lily didn't mind her mother's distraction in the least. She and Tom, her new best friend, ran through the dry, brown grass together, played on the old, tarnished swings and the iron-flecked roundabout, and even dared to sit at either end of the decomposing teeter-totter and take turns pushing off.

She'd brought him a pair of her gloves to wear, because even though it was sweaty hot out, his fingers were still quite cool, and they held hands and talked.

Every time they said good-bye, she sealed her promise to come back to him as soon as she could with a kiss to his cheek.

Too engrossed in perusing the medicine shoppe's contents, looking over every vial, bottle, and jar in the place day after day, week after week, her mother never paid Lily's absences from her side any mind. She never knew what her only daughter did when she ran off on her own, and Lily never told her, afraid of being punished for taking advantage of her mum's inattentiveness.

In truth, it tickled Lily pink that no one knew about Tom, and for a reason she couldn't explain, she liked having him as her secret.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _I'm still here…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

When autumn came around and the wind blew colder, Lily's mother began to look increasingly gaunt and ill. She took a turn with the weather, and a shroud of sadness seemed to engulf her. There were days when she wouldn't wake up until the afternoon, and Lily would have to fix her own meals out of whatever she could reach in the icebox and the pantry while she waited for her mum to wake up. Lily wondered if it wasn't because her father had sent a note informing them that he was getting married to the dark-haired woman her mother hated.

As Halloween approached, and the empty vials of medicine piled up in the bathroom sink, and the bill collectors came knocking on their door seeking money, Lily began to understand that her mother's worsening condition wasn't normal, and that her mum needed help. It had taken her mother's inability to wake up one morning, however, for her to finally act on her fears.

Her father had shown her how to use a Muggle cell-telephone, to reach him in emergencies. It was their secret that she kept hers in her desk drawer in her room. She took it out, powered it up, and hit the button her dad had shown her.

"Daddy, it's me. Something's wrong with Mummy."

Within minutes, her powerful, dark-haired father was storming through her Floo with a fierce expression on his face. He had her unconscious mum up in his arms and was whisking her away to St. Mungo's after that, instructing Lily to call Aunt Hermione on her cell phone to come sit with her before he whisked away.

Scared for her mother, Lily slept very little that night, and her dreams were of her standing in an empty playground, with no Tom, no mother, and no father to hear her crying. She'd been abandoned by everyone she loved.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Come back, please…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

It was Christmastime before Lily returned to the playground. Now, there was snow on the pavement and people hurried to and fro to get out of the biting cold. The days were shorter, the light was less, and the clouds greyer.

Her mother had finally recovered from her illness, but whatever evil coming from the Chinese medicine shoppe had nearly ended her life almost two months earlier still had an unnatural hold on her, for there was a fevered glint in her mum's eye as they neared the store now. As if she'd been charmed by the place, her mother approached its front doors and simultaneously let go of Lily's hand. Without a backward glance, she disappeared inside the store, leaving Lily alone on the sidewalk… again.

 _Come… Come be with me._

The pull of the nearby playground was, as always, a strong tug on her heart.

Glancing back at the medicine shop, with its strange smells and its blood-red painted front door and its privacy-curtained front window, she knew that her mother would be a while inside, probably slipping into the back room with the proprietor's wife to look over the rare medicines for sale. Her mum could be shopping for hours, if she kept with the pattern she'd had prior to her hospital trip. So, there would be no harm in Lily entertaining herself then, would there? She'd done it many times before, after all.

Hurrying off towards the rusted fence at the end of the block, Lily dodged and weaved around office workers moving around during lunch hours and ducked under the metal links and into her sanctuary once more without incident.

Was Tom still here? He had to be, didn't he?

Lily was no dummy. By now she'd figured out that her best friend was some kind of ghost, but he was unlike any she'd ever met before. The fact that he was always here at the playground, never seemed to need food or drink, always wore the same clothes, and never had a pee had given it away. She wanted to ask him about it, but was terribly afraid that if she did, he might simply vanish, as some ghosts after the last war were rumoured to have done.

Yes, he had to be here, still. There was nowhere else for a wandering spirit to go than to its haunting grounds, after all. "Tom? Where are you?" she called out. "I've come back!"

"Lily!"

She was engulfed in his enthusiastic hug, nearly tackled to the ground by it. She threw her own arms around Tom and held him back just as tightly. Her friend had no scent of his own, but she knew the scratchiness of his woollen coat against her cheek and hands, and recognised the feel of home that came over her whenever he touched her.

"Oh, Tom, I've missed you!"

"I thought you were never coming back," he admitted, clearly shaken by that possibility.

"I'm so sorry! Mum became frightfully ill and was in hospital." The explanation for her long absence tumbled from her quivering lips, as she burrowed her face into the lee of his throat and cried with relief that he wasn't gone forever, either. "I went to live with Daddy and his girlfriend until Mum was well. I'm sorry I couldn't keep my promise to come back until just now."

He shushed her, and his arms tightened around her. "S'okay. You're here now." He playfully ruffled her hair. "I've missed you, too, silly mop."

His nickname for her—a joke about the horrid, short haircut her mum had given her back in July—made her laugh a little.

Abruptly, he turned around and motioned for her to hop onto his back so he could carry her pickaback over to the roundabout. Eagerly, Lily jumped up and Tom hefted her up and he jogged them over to, what had become over the months, their favourite place to begin each of their play dates. With care, he set her down on the ancient machine and then, when she had a firm grip on one of the metal rails, he whirled her around and around, faster and faster until she was too dizzy and could think of nothing else. Very quickly, her worries melted away and she laughed with joy to feel the wind through her hair.

Standing up and leaning against one of the metal posts for support, she held her arms out, pretending she was a bird. Tom jumped in behind her and wrapped his arms around her, holding her within the safety of his embrace.

"It's not a broom, but see, you're flying again!" he pronounced in her ear.

She was, wasn't she?

Spinning around until she was nearly sick and too dizzy to continue, Lily realised she didn't mind so much that her mother ignored her most of the time now, or that her father was always gone away for his work, or that Jamie and Al were far away in school together. She was happy with Tom, here in the playground… happier than she'd ever been anywhere else.

* * *

 _ **TO BE CONTINUED...**_

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 **Author's Notes:**

 **Please review! Would love to hear your thoughts!**


	3. Chapter 3

**~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _We belong together…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

On Valentine's Day, Tom and Lily were lying back together in the dull, itchy grass of the playground's floor, staring up at the muted blue sky far above their heads, talking about her home life and her mother's worsening health condition. Their hands were clasped, their fingers entwined. Her jacket was stifling hot, zipped to her throat, but the air around them was as icy as Tom's touch, the chill nipping at her cheeks and nose.

"It never rains or snows here," she pointed out after a particularly long stretch of silence. "And everything's so… washed out. But there's a breeze. I can feel it. It makes me sleepy sometimes."

"It's meant to," Tom told her. "It lulls you into wanting to stay."

She turned her head towards him. "Is that what happened to you? Did you one day just decide to… stay?"

He frowned and massaged his brow in concentration. "I think a part of me did, yes. The rest… moved on, left here, lived another life. Now, I'm the only part of me left."

Lily frowned at that. Tom always talked in circles about things she didn't understand, and he never explained what he meant. Honestly, it drove her mad.

"I don't understand," she admitted.

He sighed. "Me, either. But sometimes… I get these pictures in my head of things I didn't do, but I feel like I did. They're… echoes, glimpses of the other part of me that left here, that moved on. They're in my mind for only a second, here and there, so I can't grab onto them. I can't see the whole memory. All I feel is how dark they are."

He glanced sideways at her.

"When you're here, they leave me alone, as if you've got this… this weird and special magical light inside you that chases them off. When you're gone though, they come back."

He squeezed shut his eyelids, his expression tight with his repressed fear. It found an alternative escape route through his pale, whispering lips, though.

"They always come back."

She rolled into her side and rested her head on his chest, slipping an arm around him. "I'll stay with you, Tom, for as long as I can, every time I come to visit. They won't bother you then."

"I wish we could be together forever, somehow, someway," he admitted, holding her to him as if he'd never let her go. "I'd trade anything to never have to let you go."

That was the second Lily lost her heart to her best friend.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _I need you…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

On Saint Patrick's Day, as she was leaving, Tom suddenly clung to her as she turned to crawl back under the fence.

"Don't go yet," he pleaded. "Just… just stay a little longer."

Lily hugged back with an equal desperation, her vision wavering through a hot rush of tears. She could feel Tom's fear as he trembled in her arms, and knew it was because of those memories he'd mentioned, the elusive ones that haunted him when she was far from his side.

"I don't want to remember anymore," he whispered, hiding his face in the lee of her throat. "Help me, Lily!"

She wept for her best friend, feeling helpless and so very small right then.

If only there was a way for her to save him!

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Stay with me…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

"You could stay here with me, you know."

It was almost April, but there was no bird song among the bare branches of the sole tree in the playground. There was only the sound of the wind rustling past its crooked wooden hands, stirring the creaking of the rusty swings and the pitted roundabout again, and the pounding of Lily's heart.

He'd made the suggestion with such casualness that Lily thought Tom was joking at first. One look into his anxious expression, though, and she knew he'd meant it.

"I can't."

"Why not?"

Why, indeed? She struggled to come up with reasons that mattered, for excuses that couldn't be brushed aside as ridiculous. "Because… because Daddy's getting remarried in June and I want to be there. And Al and Jamie are coming home in two months, too." She'd told Tom all about her older brothers on numerous occasions, so much so that he often joked with her that she was star-struck by her two elder siblings. "Someone has to kick them back into line for the summer," she explained, "especially with Mummy so ill."

"Why doesn't your father do that? He's the parent, not you."

She shrugged, not wanting to think about how much of an adult role she'd taken on, now that her mother had slipped back into her old ways.

Tom frowned, and Lily knew it was because she'd been spoiling him a little too much with her affections. He was used to having her all to himself for several hours each day, and if there was one thing she'd discovered about her best friend over the last year, it was that he didn't like being denied anything.

"But if things were _different_ for you…would you stay?" he pressed.

In truth, she wanted to promise him such a thing, but she knew it was an impossible vow to keep. "If I was like you, then yes, I would." She met his gaze and held it. "But I'm not like you at all, am I?"

Moving closer to her, he brought their folded knees together and leaned forward. "No, you're not like me," he admitted. Reaching up, he slowly traced a finger from her forehead down the slope of her nose. "I'm aware of that every time I touch you, just as you are when you touch me."

She playfully batted his hand away. "You're cold… and faded."

"And you're… you're warm and colourful." He tweaked her nose. "You're everything I wish I could be again, Mop. You make me want things I shouldn't." He sighed, and his long, sooty lashes dipped downward, hooding and secreting his thoughts from her. "I wish I'd known you like this before. I wish we'd grown-up together the first time, at the same time. If I'd known you then as I do now, I might not have flown at the sun with everything I had. It would have been all different." He took one of her hands in his and kissed the back of her knuckles. "I'd have loved you like I do now, and you would have been my sun instead."

There he went again, speaking in riddles…

Wait, he _loved_ her? As in, he fancied her back?

Her cheeks felt so hot at the thought it was as if she'd stood in front of her Grandmum Weasley's oven for too long.

"I… I love you, too, Tom. But I still can't stay."

He sighed with regret and looked down at her cream-coloured hands with their ragged cuticles. He kept a firm hold on them, as if he could capture the heat escaping from them for his own use.

"I know, Lily. I've always known."

* * *

 _ **TO BE CONTINUED...**_

* * *

 **Author's Note:**

 **Sorry for the delay in posting. There are some extremely stressful things happening at home right now (my husband just came home from hospital this weekend after emergency heart surgery last week, then we found a kitten in our backyard on Saturday that had been poisoned by someone in the neigbourhood and we took it in to the veterinary emergency center). Needless to say, I've been a little preoccupied with dealing with those issues. Thankfully, this piece was completed months ago, so I only need to put it up here (no additional writing required).**

 **What do you think of the tale so far? Love hearing your thoughts!** **Please review!**


	4. Chapter 4

**~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _I'll wait for you…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Lily spent her ninth birthday alone.

Her mother was passed out in her bedroom all morning and afternoon, and when she finally did appear around tea time, it was to go into the loo and then it was straight back to bed. Lily found another empty vial of medicine from the Chinese apothecary haphazardly discarded in the bathroom sink after her mum had shut her bedroom door once more. She left it alone, next to the others piling up on the counter, unsure as to what to do with them.

Her father had left last week on a mission, and she'd been told he wouldn't be back for another week. He didn't send her any notes or try to Floo-call her.

No one in her extended family, not even her brothers, sent her an owl wishing her a happy day, either.

It was as if the day was no different from any other—as if Lily had never been born.

She made herself a peanut butter sandwich for dinner, then walked down to the Muggle Co-op about a mile from her house and, using the Muggle money her father had given her as part of her Christmas gift last December, she bought a Truly Irresistible package of lemon cupcakes. She brought them home, took one out, but then realised she didn't have any candles, much less a way to light them.

She made a wish over the yellow frosted cake, anyway: for Tom to be happy.

That's all she really wanted anymore, anyway.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Ask me…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Lily scuffed her toes into the dirt, uneasy asking the question that had just popped into her mind, but figuring that if there was anyone she could talk to about painful or important things, it would be Tom. He never shied away from answering her bizarre questions, and he never lied to her.

"So, is the playground your Heaven?"

Sitting in the swing next to hers, Tom stared down at the track that years of push-offs and stops had grooved into the earth beneath him and frowned. "Hmm, I'm not sure. Maybe it is. Or maybe it's my Hell instead." He glanced around at the dull landscape of the playground. "Certainly looks like Hell, doesn't it?"

Lily gasped and swatted at him, causing their swings to give an ominous creak. "Don't say that! You couldn't have gone to Hell!"

He glanced sideways at her. "How do you know? I could have done something really bad before."

"Not likely."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because you're not evil. Just a brat."

She giggled mischievously and dashed up and out of her swing for the roundabout, knowing Tom would give a merry chase. He did, and they spent the next several minutes playing 'Tag, You're It!' He yelled that he planned to spank her for calling him such a name once he caught her, which only sent Lily into a fit of laughter and had her taunting, 'Catch me if you can!'

Eventually, he did, tackling her to the ground. Tom pounced atop her and began tickling her sides until she threatened to pee if he didn't stop. He only gave up the game once she cried surrender. He crawled off her then and collapsed at her side, laughing right along with her.

"Maybe you are evil," she jokingly admitted. "I nearly wet myself!"

"You'd deserve it." He looked smug.

"Would not."

"Would, too."

"Not."

"Too."

She stuck her tongue out at him. He made a fake snipping gesture with his fingers, as if he'd cut her tongue off if she did it again.

They both erupted into gales of laughter once more.

"You know I love you, Mop," he said, turning on his side and facing her. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a ring made of woven grass. "Happy late birthday."

Her smile nearly broke her face as she took his gift and put it on her left ring finger. "Thank you, Tom. It's wonderful!"

As she admired it, Lily thought she'd finally found her real family right here in the playground.

"I love you, too."

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _I love you…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

"It's my punishment, I think. Being trapped here."

Lily pulled her eyes from the ground far below to glance over at Tom. This position high up in the air on the teeter-totter was her favourite. "How do you figure that?"

"Because I did something terrible once when I was this age, and I think I lost my innocence from it."

Lily frowned, again befuddled by Tom's reference to his previous life. He talked about it as if he hadn't died at age 10—the age he appeared to her. It was as if he was implying that somehow, after his death, a flesh and blood part of him had still managed to keep on living, but she didn't think it was possible for a ghost to do such a thing.

"I don't understand. Was it something to do with magic, you think?"

She'd long ago confessed to Tom that she was a witch, having already proven her talents when, at the age of five, a bit of accidental magic had caused to her charming Jamie's hair bright green and his teeth purple. Besides, she was pretty sure that talking about such things with a ghost (or whatever Tom was) didn't break the Statute of Secrecy, as it wasn't as if Muggles could even see him.

"Mmm," he replied with a small nod.

"What did you do?"

His mouth scrunched up into a queer, little shape, and then he got off the teeter-totter, catching it so she didn't fall. He put pressure on his end until her feet touched the earth, and only let go of his side once she was free and clear. He then held his hand out for her to take and led her over to the lone tree on the lot, where they sat down side-by-side, leaning against its thick trunk.

"I… I killed someone's pet. A rabbit."

Lily couldn't have been more surprised. "Really?"

"Mmm," he said again—his typical response when he didn't want to baldly confess to some wrong doing or thinking.

The idea that Tom could have intentionally harmed something—seemed unreal. He was always so charming and kind to her. "Why would you?"

He sighed, rubbing a hand over his eyes, as if to wipe away exhaustion. "I used to dream all the time about being adopted, you know. Back when I was…" He stumbled over the word, 'alive', as if it were taboo. "Anyway, I'd pretend there was someone else out there meant to come here and find me, to take me home with them. A new mother and father. They'd be rich, nobby, titled. You know what I mean… the kind of people with the right blood."

Yes, Lily was old enough to understand that there were some people in the world who believed themselves better than others because of their wealth or their last name or their job. However, her Aunt Hermione was constantly on about how such things were nonsense and how everyone was equal, so Lily really didn't see why it mattered to Tom whether he'd been adopted by a poor family or a rich one. Wasn't the love you received the same?

And really, who cared if you were poor, so long as someone was present and interacting with you on a regular basis? She would trade her rare Exploding Snap collectible cards (the ones Albus had once whined for hours about losing to her) for someone who would make her breakfast, or who would play out in the garden with her, or who would take her up on their old, straw-bare broom high into the sky… That sort of thing was infinitely better than living in a posh house that was quiet and utterly without love, as she did.

He waved his hand at their surroundings. "The playground was in the side yard then, and had an excellent view of the front gate and walk. I thought that if I stayed out here all day long, in between my studies, and meals, and chores, I'd be the first to see any new couples coming through the gate of the orphanage. I hoped that they'd see me playing and smiling out here, and know I was the perfect, little boy for them. Then, they'd adopt me and I'd finally have a family. I'd be wanted."

"But no one ever came," she guessed.

He scowled. "Someone did, sure. Billy Stubbs. He tried to bully me into abandoning the playground." He picked up a small rock nearby and skipped it across the sea of brown grass with an easy and practised flick of his wrist. "But I refused to go. He was bigger than me, stronger and older, but I didn't want to give up my chance for freedom. So, I held onto the swing's chains as he slapped me around. He hit me so hard my nose bled. Then, he punched me in the gut, and that's when I finally let go and fell down. He laughed at me as I gushed blood all over the grass. A fountain's worth at least!"

Tom reached up and touched the area above his lip, as if he were reliving the memory of that terrible day. Lily felt a strong compulsion to put her fingers of his and trace the area where he'd been hurt, as if to soothe it, but she kept her hands to herself. Something about the moment felt too private for her to interfere. Instead, she remained silent and listened.

"It wasn't until later that night I found out why Billy wanted the playground to himself," he continued. "Stubbs knew what I was doing, and he wanted to play at being the perfect boy, too. He intended on being the first of us adopted, so he stole my idea." His smirk became positively wicked and his blue eyes twinkled with remembered triumph. "I kept it from happening, though. He was never adopted, same as me."

The look in Tom's eyes… Lily had never seen him like this. "What did you do?" she asked. "Did you hurt him?" A part of her actually hoped he had. Billy Stubbs sounded like the worst sort, and someone who deserved to be punished.

He shrugged. "As I said, I killed his pet rabbit. I used magic to spill its life all over the playground. Then I hung it from the roof's rafters. He never hurt me again after that."

Lily considered that for a moment. "And doing that trapped you here?"

He raised a knee, laid an arm across it. "I took a life with magic." He rubbed at his forehead. "I seem to recall something about how that divides you up somehow. And I do feel… split in two."

"That's weird."

He suddenly seemed very sad. "Isn't it? I got left behind, while the rest of me… went on. Now, I can't leave here. Day after day, it's just me and the playground. We never change. We're always the same. It's… Hell." He looked at her, blinking back tears. "You're the first good thing to happen to me, Lily. The first person to ever want me—the real me. Ever."

She embraced Tom, letting him cry on her shoulder, and her heart broke for him, for his anguish over feeling unloved. She could intimately relate.

"Someday, you'll leave me, too," he sobbed. "You'll have to. You'll go on, and I'll still be stuck here, forever alone." He tightened his hold on her, as afraid of that premonition coming true sooner rather than later. "I don't want to lose you."

There were no words of comfort she could offer him right then, because Lily feared he was right. Every day she grew older and he didn't, and in two years, she would be off to Hogwarts and unable to visit him. Then he really would be all alone.

How horrible, she thought, to be doomed to eternity like this for killing a stupid rabbit. If only she could do something to help him!

* * *

 _ **TO BE CONCLUDED...**_

* * *

 **Author's Notes:**

 **One more chapter to go. What do you think Tom and Lily will do to stay together? Throw me your best guesses (and no cheating by looking up the fest submission for this story!).**


	5. Chapter 5-FINAL

**Author's Notes:**

 **This chapter was changed from the original fest piece, fleshed out a bit more to make it more well-rounded and with a completely different ending (I chucked the original idea out and went with, what I think, it a better one). Hope you enjoy!**

* * *

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Remember me..._

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Day after day, Lily returned to the playground not just to swing or play tag, but also to listen to Tom as he talked for hours about magic, discussing things no one in her family had ever thought her clever enough to understand. She wasn't sure where he got the knowledge from, but assumed it was coming from the memories of that other life he's spoken of—the one he'd been split from so long ago. The part of him that had 'moved on'.

To her delight, he made schooling a snap, and fun. He even helped her to concentrate a little to try out a few simple spells of her own, using a broken tree branch from the nearby English oak to act as her wand. It turned out Lily was a rather powerful witch even without the aid of a wand core to amplify her abilities, and Tom was even smarter than her cousin Rose, only a whole lot less smug about it.

To her relief, no one came to take her away or scold her for practising magic, despite the fact she'd been expressly instructed never to do so as she was still underage. No one seemed to know about her breaking Ministry law, and consequently, the playground remained her secret.

Today, they were discussing the different types of power used to make spells work.

"Some magic's fueled by emotion in the moment, and some from memory of things that came before," Tom said, glancing around at the playground with a scowl. "Take for instance, this place: it was created by blood and rage, and the memory magic of that event curses it to remain in effect forever." He tossed a rock hard, skipping it across the dry, dusty ground. It bounced three times before smashing into the fence and stopping. "Which means I'm nothing but a sodding photograph, trapped within the confines of the playground's frame."

Sitting next to him on the roundabout, Lily noted the darkness creeping into the hollows of his cheeks and the corners of his eyes and wanting to chase it away. It happened sometimes, especially when it was fast approaching her time to leave him and he was feeling resentful and a little sulky about that.

She took his hand in hers, pressing them palm to palm, ignoring the chill that went through her from the cold of his flesh. "You feel very real to me, Tom."

They stared at each other, the moment sharp with strange, fluttery anticipation.

He threaded his fingers through hers, curling them in and clasping them together. "I've been thinking about that for weeks," he admitted. "Wondering why you can be here with me, touch me, when no one else can."

Lily licked her lips, watching as he tracked the movement through a half-lidded gaze. His long, sooty lashes were so pretty...

"And have you figured it out yet?"

Tom leaned forward, moving slowly. "Close your eyes," he whispered.

Lily obeyed.

Noting happened for few seconds, and then...

His lips were cold, but the small kiss he gave her warmed her to her toes.

"Did you like that?" he asked as he pulled away, releasing her.

She nodded, touching her small fingertips to her dry mouth and rubbing her bottom lip. "Did you?"

He looked smug, leaning back on his hands and staring up at the slowly sinking afternoon sun. "Speaking of memories, bet you won't forget _that_ one any time soon."

No, Lily knew she never would. It had been her first real kiss, after all.

She suspected it had been Tom's, too.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Forget them…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Lily knocked on her mother's bedroom door.

"Mum, dinner's on. Won't you come out now?"

Her mother didn't respond.

Ginny Weasley appeared an hour later only to use the loo, then in a dazed, rumpled, smelly state stumbled back into her room, locking the door behind her.

With a sigh, Lily emptied her mother's now-cold soup into the bin and then cleaned up the dishes.

"'Night, Mum," she called through the door, heading for her own room.

There was no reply. In fact, Lily's mum seemed not to have heard her daughter at all. It was as if Lily had become a ghost herself.

She'd been forgotten, too.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _You are mine, now and forever…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Lily was drinking from a water bottle she'd brought to the playground in her satchel when Tom came upon a sudden idea as to how to solve his problem.

"Trading places. Someone takes my place here."

That didn't sound like much of a solution to her. "I hope you don't mean me."

He shook his head. "Of course not, silly. The point is for us to be together outside of here, so obviously, it would have to be someone else."

Swapping an eternity of living here for the real world? Who in their right mind would do such a thing. "Alright, then who? And how would you do it?"

Tom hopped off the roundabout and lifted his arms to indicate the whole lot. "Look, the reason I'm stuck here at all, I figure, is because of the spell I accidentally activated when I killed Stubbs' rabbit. Like the old nursery rhyme says: _'Blood and memory… something living, something dead… and a soul in trade.'_ That's all it took: the rabbit's blood, my memories—which I'm still getting back, the rabbit's life and death, and it's soul in trade. Shady deal. It divided my soul and turned the playground into a sort of… What's the word?" He rapped the side of his head with his knuckles. "A… a cursed place or thing where a piece of a spirit is trapped."

Lily knew precisely what he was getting at, as she had heard of such awful magic a couple of years ago.

Her and her brothers had shared a tent while on a family camping trip, and they'd stayed up late that first night, reciting scary tales long after their parents had gone to sleep in their own tent. James (who had heard it from Teddy, who'd heard it from their Aunt Hermione and Uncle Ron) had regaled her and Albus with the full account of the dark wizard, Voldemort, including their father's years-long hunt to destroy the enemy.

That night, she'd heard for the first time the story of the haunted locket that had driven her Uncle Ron mad, and the fire that had destroyed the precious diadem and killed a boy, and the diary that had bled black blood when stabbed with a Basilisk fang. It had been something of a surprise to learn that her mother had been accidentally ensnared in that last tale, too, and had almost died at the age of eleven because of it.

That had been their last family trip together, she realised.

"You mean a horcrux?" she asked.

Tom's head jerked back, his face as pale than the moon's complexion. "How do you know that word?"

She shrugged. "Everyone knows. Daddy won the war by destroying the evil wizard's horcruxes."

Her best friend didn't reply, but he did look at her with an intense eye.

Feeling awkward discussing dark magic out in the open and so casually, and at the intense scrutiny she was now under, Lily glanced around. "So, um, you're saying you accidentally made a horcrux of the playground by murdering the rabbit." She considered that. "That makes sense, actually. But… how come I'm the only one who can see you?"

Tom seemed to consider her words, and she could read in his face how conflicted he seemed by his thoughts. "Because..." He sighed, seeming resigned in telling her what he was thinking. "Because I think you're _that_ Lily, the witch who died to defeat Death. The witch whose love saved the world with a spell rooted in dark magic, too."

"Er… what?"

He waved his hand, as if it were of no matter, clearly reconsidering discussing his thoughts on the issue. "The point is, you've gotten your second chance to chase the sun, Mop, and I want mine... so I can chase you. What good is power if you have no one to share it with, yeah? But I think the only way to do that is for someone to come here and take my place. A soul for a soul, bound by the power of a strong memory and some blood." He threw himself down on the roundabout next to her and leaned back on his elbows. "So, can you think of anyone who wouldn't mind dying? Or, at least, anyone you wouldn't mind losing?"

A sudden thought of vials of medicine stacked in the bathroom, and a vacant, disinterested, dark brown gaze that was glazed by potions came instantly to mind.

Lily had chewed her bottom lip, contemplating the idea of a swap.

"Maybe."

Tom glanced up at her, and in his shrewd, blue gaze, she read triumph.

"Are you sure?" he asked her, speaking slowly and clearly, as if he wanted her to be positive of her decision before committing to it... and to him.

Taking a deep breath, she nodded once.

"I want to be with you outside of here, Tom. I want to grow old with you... no matter what it costs." She crawled onto his lap sideways, like she'd seen Pansy do with her father whenever she wanted to prove her love, and wrapped her arms around him. Resting her cheek against his shoulder, she whispered, "Tell me how to save you. I'll do anything you ask."

Holding tightly to her, Tom kissed the side of her temple, and then he began to speak.

When he was done, Lily knew what she had to do next.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Goodbye._

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

The funeral of Ginevra Potter sent the wizarding nation of Britain into deep mourning, despite the nature of her death. She'd been a Weasley after all, the only daughter of that great dynasty, and the ex-wife of the Boy-Who'd-Conquered, and a war heroine in her own right. Everyone mourned her, calling her violent suicide a tragedy and a shame.

That her comatose, nine-year-old daughter had been found next to her bloodied body in that same abandoned lot down the way from the shoppe where the elder witch bought the infamous vial that had ended her life had been doubly disturbing. Everyone at St. Mungo's had assumed the little girl had been a victim of her mother's attempt at a murder-suicide.

Thankfully, Lily Luna Potter had woken up eight days later without any sort of lingering, negative health effects from witnessing and surviving her mad mother's death.

Her strange, lingering amnesia of that day and the entire year proceeding it, however, still couldn't be explained.

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 ** _Epilogue: Twelve Years Later_**

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

Lily liked her new haircut, despite the fact Rose called it a bit 'moppish' for its short, fringe style. She'd wanted a new look to go with the (relatively) new job, and there was no time like a girl's twenty-first birthday for her to take a chance, right?

Speaking of chances... She was running late for her interview!

Grabbing her satchel with her Quick Quotes Quill and notebook inside, she adjusted her professional business robes one last time before touching the international portkey that was to take her to Norway, where the Durmstrang Institute was holding its Dark Arts symposium.

Despite the fact she was still getting her feet wet at _The Prophet_ , she'd been given a lucky break and granted an interview with today's keynote speaker, a genius in the field and the current instructor for the school's Defence Against the Dark Arts classes, a Mister Thomas Icarus.

In truth, she'd practically wet herself in excitement when the man had sent her an Owl'd letter out of the blue requesting the meeting today. He'd probably contacted her because she was the daughter of the famous Harry Potter, but Lily wasn't too prideful not to ride her father's coattails to get at a prize. Her Slytherin training had taught her that the ends justified the means, after all. A solid piece on the young, but well-respected Professor Icarus could be her big break into the world of reporting the serious news. After six months of writing the crap assignments, she was ready to move onward and upwards.

The symposium hadn't begun, thankfully, by the time she'd touched down at Durmstrang's front gate. She could see wizards and witches from all over the world just then arriving, too, walking in twos and threes up to the cab area to hitch a lift.

To her surprise, a dark, horseless Landaulet Brougham with curtained windows sat waiting for her to take her up to the castle. She knew it was meant for her because a sign with her name written on it in elegant, large handwriting hung from the side door like an old-fashioned caller's placket. She boogied on up to it, opened the door and stepped in...

...to discover she wasn't alone.

"Oh," she gasped, startled by the presence of the strange man already occupying one of the plush, cushioned benches. He sat as if he'd been there a while, legs crossed, clearly at ease with the wait. "I didn't realise this carriage was occupied. I'll just wait–"

"No need," the man stated, and with a wave of his hand, the door shut her in and the Landaulet, propelled by a spell, began moving them up the long, windy path through the mountains to the heart of the school.

Lily quickly took the seat opposite the stranger, keeping her wand in her hand and a wary eye upon him. Fortunately, the carriage had a dim internal light source hovering up near the top corner, allowing her the opportunity to not only see her companion, but to watch his every move as well.

To her pleasant surprise, her silent companion was quite attractive. Pale features, dark, glossy hair, blue eyes that watched her with both fascination and anticipation.

"You're here for the symposium, too," she guessed, attempting to discern if this man was competition for the story or a member of the audience.

His lips twitched with mirth. "You could say that, Miss Potter, yes."

Had he guessed her name from the door's sign, or had he been waiting here to greet her in advance? "You have me at a disadvantage, sir. You know my name, but I don't recognise you."

The stranger smiled at her, and the look only magnified his attractiveness, making Lily acutely aware of her heartbeat tripling in speed quite suddenly. This one knew well how to use his charms, it seemed. And... there was something familiar about that smile, too.

He held up his hand, extending his arm towards her. His fingers were tightly clenched around something in his palm.

"What if I were to tell you that you do know me?"

He opened his hand, and in the centre of his palm was a small ring made of dried grass woven together. Within its fibers was interwoven strands of red hair that were the same dark scarlet hue as her own.

Something itched within the back of Lily's brain. Something important that burbled forth the moment she stretched her hand out and touched the odd token in the man's hand. 'Blood and memory," she whispered, the child's nursery rhyme having crept forward from the darkest vaults of her mind, coming back not as a song as it had always been traditionally sung, but as an incantation. "Something living, something dead… and a soul in trade.'

Her companion nodded. "The recipe for the oldest and darkest of magical incantations. Its result, however, depends upon its use. Love yourself too much, and it creates a horcrux."

"Love someone else, and it'll save their life," she finished, the fog within her head of that lost year from her childhood slowly lifting, like a dark cloud moving past the sun.

She suddenly recognised the face of the man across from her. No longer a boy, but all grown up. Her vision grew wavy, her eyes hot as tears gathered.

"Tom? Is it really you?"

Tom smiled again, closing his fingers over hers, and this time, they were warm with life and filled with magic. With a tug, he drew her across the space and into his arms. Holding Lily tight, as he used to do, he pressed a small kiss to her cheek.

"Caught you at last, my fiery, sweet sun."

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

 _Come play with me…_

 **~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~**

.

 ** _~FIN~_**

* * *

 **Author's Final Notes:**

 **Yes, Lily Luna is meant to be Lily Evan's reincarnation (I received some notes from people during the fest who were confused by that part). If you'll recall, her protection spell to save Harry's life required her to die for it to activate. I thought that strangely close to what a horcrux does (it requires someone to die to work), and so capitalized on that bit for this fic.**

 **I found it rather fun to put Tom and Lily together like this, since he murdered her when she was Lily Evans-Potter, and her protection spell was responsible (ultimately) for ending him as Lord Voldemort during the First War. They were enemies who fell in love in this incarnation instead. Irony, it's so... ironic. ;)**

 **So, no, this wasn't really a horror story-except the bit with them murdering Ginny to free Tom, but then... was it really murder, since it was clear Ginny wanted to die anyway and was well on her way towards that ultimate conclusion by her own hand? Was it a kindness they did Ginny and simply used her death to their advantage, or was it cold, calculated murder on both Tom and Lily's parts? I suppose _that's_ something horrific for you to mull over. Ah, subjective ethics!**

 **In any case, this was fun for my first Tom Riddle as main character fic. Ditto for Lily Luna. Perhaps I'll get a chance to visit this ship again someday with a different premise... if someone prompts it for a future fest. (HINT HINT)**

 **In any case, thanks for reading and always for your lovely reviews!**

 **XOXOXO,**

 **\- RZZMG**


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